“Because, warned, you may strike back?”
“I? The least of them? I think they do not deem that possible.” He had no shame in that saying. “They may not know me yet, however. Now-can you ride?”
“I think that I had better-“
He nodded. “It will not be for more than a day. We draw near to gate. But, I ask of you, keep in mind that still we deal in illusions and it is best not to fight before we must-“
Herrel spoke as if together we faced danger. Yet in me I was alone, all alone. There was no Herrel I could depend upon, there was a man and a beast, and neither dared I cling to. But that I would not dispute upon now, not when I was so tired in mind and body.
“I fell and hit my head on a stone.” I said as one repeating a well learned lesson. “There was no battle?”
“No battle.” he agreed.
“In my dream battle then.” I pursued the question.”what force trailed us and what weapon did they use which might have destroyed your illusions?”
“You remember it all?”
“I remember-“
“They were Hounds of Alizon. But some of them must have been schooled in the knowledge they make such a parade of abhorring. What they sent to confuse us was a power of the dark to shape change and then enforce that change to continue. In this they heaped their own grave mounds-better would they have wrought to keep us men.”
“How many of them were there? And why did they attack?”
“Twenty-that we found. It was cleverly planned for they split our party with a false trail and then struck at what they deemed the weaker portion. As for why? They carried Hallack shields and blazons-thus they wished to embroil us with the Dales. It is only the dark arrow we do not understand, that has no place in their armament.”
“Herrel-“ Hyron, his crest of a rearing stallion plain in the growing daylight, stood at the open end of the lean-to.
“Lady-“ he sketched a hand salute to me, but I noted that he did not really look in my direction. “It is time we ride. You are able to, lady?”
I wanted to say now, that I could not cling to a saddle, that I had no desire, nor strength to face a day’s ride across this land which was enemy to my kind. But I could not say those words; instead I found myself nodding as if what he willed could only be my heart’s desire also.
We rode, but in a different pattern from that which we had followed before. Now woman companied woman; the men threw out advance scouts and set a rear guard. I looked to Kildas at my left, Solfinna at my right. Neither seemed apprehensive, nor did they remark upon this division.
“Hisin says that this night shall we bide in the outer way.” Solfinna’s words broke my absorption. “Soon there will be an end to this journeying, though we are still two days from the appointed hour. Very fair must be the land beyond the Safekeep-“ She smiled happily.
“Gillan, you have said so little. Does your head still ache?” Kildas shifted a little in the saddle to look at me more closely.
“It aches, yes, and I dreamed ill in the night.”
To my surprise she nodded. “Yes, Herrel was in great concern when you cried out. He strove to wake you, but when he touched you, Hyron bade him cease for you seemed in even greater distress. Then he put something into your hand, and thereafter you quieted.”
“Why did that so anger Hyron?” Solfinna broke in. “I could not see that it did harm, rather good.”
“Hyron was angered?”
“Yes-“ Solfinna began but Kildas broke in:
“I do not think angered, rather concerned. We all were, Gillan, for you cried out strange things we could not understand, which frightened, as if you were caught in a very evil dream.”
“I do not remember.” I lied. “One may do such after a head blow, that much I know from heal-craft. And this land is so dreary it puts phantoms into one’s mind-“
My first real error. Kildas looked at me oddly.
“The land lies under winter, but it is like unto the Dales. Why men speak of it as a waste, I do not understand. Look you how the sun touches all to diamond snow and crystal ice?”
Sun? Where shown any sun? We moved under a leaden sky. And the diamond snow was rimed drifts. Icy coated branches spoke only of frozen death. Illusion-Now I wanted to share that illusion for my own comfort. But this time, for all my willing, I could not see the land under the beneficent haze through which my companions moved. All was grey, grim, stark, with branches reaching for us like the misshapen hands of monsters, while every shadow could be granted evil and alien life of its own, lying in wait for the unwary.
I closed my eyes against what was real to me, summoned my will, desired to see…only top open sight once more on the same forbidding countryside. Also-the rush of power I had come to associate with my will-summons did not answer-save as a weak and quickly ebbing ripple. And with that discovery self-distrust awoke in me, weakening me yet further. But I needs must guard my tongue and strive to fight my fears.
Now and again one of the Riders came to bear us company for a short while-always the mate of one of the brides. Then I noted that Herrel did not come so, nor had I seen him since we rode out of camp, though Halse passed twice down the line. Once when the bear-man slacked pace and Solfinna jogged ahead, I spoke, perhaps recklessly, but as I thought was only natural. “My lord, where rides Herrel?”
There was that derisive smile on his face as he made answer courteously enough, but with such under mockery as to be an unseen blow.
“He rides rear guard, my lady. Shall I tell him you wish words with him? Doubtless some message of importance?”
“No. Just tell him all is well-“
Those red eyes searching me, trying to read my thoughts. Could these sorcerers in truth read thoughts? I did not believe so.
“You are wise not to draw him from his duty. Hyron believes him now best employed for the service of the company. And we must rest upon the best defences we can muster-“
Words innocent enough, but so delivered that a threat ran beneath their smooth surface. And now Halse, in a low voice, added more:
“I would have nay-said Herrel could gain a bride. Has he told you that in this company he is the wrong-handed, the limper? But destiny is right after all, now we consider him well matched-“ till he smiled, and it was enough to make one dread all smiles.
“I thank you, my lord.” From some last bulwark of pride and defiance I summoned those words. “Can any one truly say what a man is, or may come to be? If cloak-spell united us, then you will not miscall your own power. I am content, if my lord is also.” A lie, and a He he knew, yet one I would continue to cling to.
The method of our pairing from the bridal dale had been such that we knew only he whose cloak we had chosen-knew him? That was not my case certainly. But as to his fellow Riders, what did any of us know? My companions were so bound in illusion woven to hold them apart from the truth, that they would accept any seeing. Me-I was so torn with fear and suspicion that perhaps I saw awry also. Yet Halse I did not like, nor did I take kindly to the gaze Hyron turned upon me. And I had felt the animosity of those others last night.
What of Herrel? Yes, what of Herrel? Our first meeting when he had taken me to wife, in name, by the cloak about my shoulders…the night when I had been willed by another’s ill wishing to wake and see him as he could be and was, upon occasion. Last night when I had watched him go into battle and heard the horror of that fight-
I had come to our first meeting prepared to accept an alien-or had I really? Can anyone accept what they do not know? Now after testing I was as faint-hearted as Marimme, if able to conceal it better. Was Herrel a beast who could put on the semblance of a man for his purposes, or a man putting on the beast? It was this question ever seesawing at the back of my mind which made my flesh shiver and cringe from his touch, made me rejoice he was not my mate in truth. Kildas, Solfinna, the rest, they harboured no doubts. I believed they were all wives as I was not. But which husbanded them-beast and bird-or human body?